Taming the Inner Fear Beast

I am fantastic at dreaming and planning. A queen at it. I can sit down with a blank piece of paper and some markers, and craft the most gorgeous life you've ever seen. A thing of beauty. It would bring tears to your eyes. Unfortunately, the vision stays right there on the paper. The actual creation of that life is another story altogether. Mostly it just doesn't happen. I just do the visioning part over and over again.

It's not that I don't have the skills to actually carry out the action steps. On the Meyers-Briggs Personality Type Indicator, I'm an INFJ, which should mean that I am capable of being both the visionary and the doer. Theoretically, I can both dream the dream and bring it into reality without great difficulty. I should be aces at this. But in actuality, I seem to hit the skids on a regular basis.

This is what I think happens: I'm not so good at just letting things be, once I've embarked on a journey. I immediately start questioning myself. I forget what my original dream was, and I start complicating things. Fear and anxiety get the best of me, and I start thinking in terms of "should" rather than flowing with what I really want to do. It's like I'm living in one of those mazes where you know there's something great waiting for you just outside the maze, and you know there's a path laid out that will get you there, but you can't seem to get there because you keep taking these wrong turns and the map doesn't make any sense, and you know that if you could just get to a higher level you could see what you need to do.

And then I pick up my camera and get outside, and suddenly things become so clear. I stop questioning my every thought, and all the wrong paths disappear from my mind altogether. The only path that remains is the one that leads me directly to the great thing.

This is what creativity does for me. It connects me deeply with my most true self, and empowers me to share that self with the world. My fearful thoughts all drift away, and for a little while the inner beast is quiet. One of my clients recently told me that creativity does the same thing for her. She has a personality disorder, and she often hears negative thoughts telling her that no one in her life loves her, and that she's just a nuisance who nobody really cares about. When these voices get really strong, she turns to her creative hobbies, and something about getting in the zone and focusing on creation just drowns out those voices. Once those voices are gone, she is able to find her balance again.

Eventually the inner beast comes back, of course, for both of us, but those moments of peace, calm, and inspiration are a balm to my otherwise perfectionist-seeking brain. They are why I keep going back to my creative endeavors, even when my inner fearful, anxious beast is very nervous about them, even when I convince myself I don't have time for them, and even when the world doesn't respond in the way my beast wants it to. Because ultimately, I'm not writing or taking pictures for them. Really, underneath it all, I'm just doing it for me. I'm doing it because it helps me align with the deepest and truest version of me. If someone else likes what that "me" has to say, then wonderful. I'm thrilled if the realest me can be of service to someone else. But if I'm only serving myself, that's a worthy enough cause. If I'm only taking that picture for me, so that I can be reminded of how beautiful this world is, that's good enough. I deserve that reminder as much as anyone else. My words, my dreams, and my voice matters just as much as everyone else's.

And so does yours. Speak your words for you. Put your truths, your feelings, your dreams out into the world. Even if your inner beast gets very nervous. Even if you think you don't have time. Even if the world doesn't respond in the way that you want it to. Do it anyway, so that you can connect with that truest, most real version of you. Because you deserve to get to know THAT version of you, underneath the fearful inner beast. We are all more than our fears.

Love,

Amy